


Boyfriend Duty

by DiscontentedWinter



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Military, Closeted Character, Deputy Derek Hale, M/M, Soldier Stiles Stilinski, fandomcares
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-09
Updated: 2020-07-09
Packaged: 2021-03-05 00:41:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,660
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25155640
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DiscontentedWinter/pseuds/DiscontentedWinter
Summary: Stiles is coming home.
Relationships: Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski
Comments: 293
Kudos: 2197
Collections: Fandom Cares





	Boyfriend Duty

**Author's Note:**

  * For [MishaAteMyBlog](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MishaAteMyBlog/gifts).



> This was written as an auction fic for fandomcares. Thank you so much to MishaAteMyBlog for supporting such a great cause, and for Fandomcares for putting everything together! 
> 
> This was the picture prompt: 
> 
> I took longer to get to this than I wanted, because Bunnywest and I were also in the middle of writing a novel. (If you want to know more about that, check my Tumblr)

About an hour out of Travis Air Force Base, a weird sort of tension grips everyone, like they’ve just been told they’re coming in for a hot landing. Even Stiles, who has spent the last twenty-four hours telling himself not to get too excited, can feel himself responding to the apprehension in the air, his nerves vibrating like the strings of that cheap piece-of-shit guitar that Steiner bought in that market in Kabul because he swore he could play it. (He couldn’t.)

Stiles plays with his phone, flicking between screens with his thumb because he needs to do something, but at the same time he can’t settle on which game to open. He’s so fucking sick of Candy Crush. He is the reigning fucking _king_ of Candy Crush, but if he never plays it again in his life it’ll still be way too soon.

Erica leans over and plucks his earbuds out of his tunic pocket.

“Hey!” Stiles grabs for the trailing cord, but misses.

“I wouldn’t have to steal yours if you hadn’t stood on mine and broken them.”

That’s true, but then again, if she hadn’t left them dangling on the floor of the plane, Stiles wouldn’t have stood on them to begin with when he went to the bathroom.

Besides, it’s an hour to go. He doesn’t need his earbuds. He can pick up a new pair soon. His stomach jolts when he thinks of it. Just… he can just walk into a store, and pick up a new pair, as easy as that.

Boyd will let them stop for earbuds, right? Stiles has never actually met the guy, but he’s spent the last five and a half months hearing about just how fucking amazing he is. And how amazing at fucking, though Stiles is taking that to his grave. Boyd doesn’t need to know that Stiles knows about that thing he does with… well.

Stiles gives up the earbuds without any further protest, and turns his attention back to his phone. He goes to his email again, just to check the one from Dad, in case it’s somehow magically transformed itself into a “Yes, son, my day is entirely free and I will come and meet you at Travis” instead of “I’m working nights, let me know what time you get in.” Because no, no way in hell is Stiles expecting his dad to drive three hours each way after working a night shift. Also, what the hell is he doing working nights at his age anyway? Shouldn’t a benefit of being the sheriff mean doing fewer shitty graveyard shifts?

Anyway, he’d told Dad he’d make his own way home to Beacon Hills.

Last week it hadn’t seemed like a huge deal that Dad wouldn’t be there to meet him—what’s another couple of hours after almost six months?—but now Stiles regrets it. He’s pretty sure he’s going to feel sad and pathetic when he’s the only guy there who has nobody waiting for him. 

And it’s not that Stiles hasn’t got anyone at all, it’s just…

It’s just _complicated_.

Derek isn’t out.

Stiles can still remember the way Erica had wrinkled her nose when he’d whispered that, but they were both huddled in a ditch full of muddy water at the time, so it might not have been a _total_ judgement about Stiles’s choice in men. He’s pretty sure it was at least eighty percent judgement though. Maybe eighty-five.

“I don’t mean he’s in the closet because he’s bi,” Stiles had tried to clarify. “I mean, he’s in the closet about being a person with actual human emotions and needs.”

Erica had given him a narrow-eyed look. “Explain.”

And so Stiles had.

“He’s got a history,” he’d said. “And I mean a _history_. When he was a teenager, his girlfriend at the time burned down his house with his family inside. It’s a miracle they weren’t killed.”

He didn’t mention that Derek’s “girlfriend” Kate was in her late twenties, and a substitute teacher at the high school.

Erica’s jaw had dropped.

“Then last time he dated someone seriously, she emptied his bank accounts and tried to poison him before he found out.” He’d shrugged, trying to ignore the muddy water seeping into his pants. “Like, there are guys with trust issues, and then, over there on an entire new planet, is Derek.”

Come to think of it, Jennifer was a teacher as well.

Derek really needs to stay away from teachers, apparently.

“I’m sorry,” Erica had said. “Are you dating a man or the lead character in a telenovela?”

“Shut up.”

“I think you might be dating the lead character in a telenovela,” she’d decided. “I’ve seen the pictures on your phone. Miguel is hot as fuck.”

“His name isn’t Miguel.”

“Of course it is,” Erica had insisted. “Miguel Ruiz-Santiago. He’s a male model and also a billionaire businessman. He has dark secrets in his past, and probably an evil twin.”

They’d giggled and snorted about it until Raeken had told them to shut the fuck up, he was trying to sleep.

Erica worries though, and Stiles loves her for it. She worries that he’s dating someone in the closet, even though she doesn’t know the half of it, because Stiles is pretty sure Derek Hale is it for him. Derek’s not just some guy he’s seeing. Derek’s the guy he loves.

Stiles closes Dad’s email and goes to Derek’s.

At first Derek’s emails had been as stilted as his conversations. Derek doesn’t talk in words, he talks in eyebrows. It’s a thing, and it doesn’t translate well over email. Those first few exchanges, he might as well have been enquiring about the weather. But then he started to open up more. Said he missed Stiles. Said he loved Stiles. Said he couldn’t wait to see him again.

It hadn’t carried over to Skype. Mostly because the calls were always laggy, and it felt like watching a badly dubbed foreign movie where the mouths and the words didn’t line up. It was distracting as hell. Also, Derek’s written words might have expanded, but his conversational skills were as terrible as always, except this time Stiles couldn’t just take his hand and smile, and ease him through his discomfort. It didn’t help that the calls were monitored and they both knew it—Derek had clammed up tight. So they’d both sat there, half a world apart, squinting at their screens and trying to think of things to say.

Erica always ended her calls with Boyd with the biggest grin on her face. Stiles always ended his with Derek feeling like he’d taken a punch in the gut.

A part of him is afraid that when he gets home to Beacon Hills, Derek will deliver the knockout punch that ends their relationship. That he’ll look at Stiles, regret and heartbreak in his eyes, and say that he’s sorry, but he can’t do this. And he’ll tell Stiles it’s not his fault, that if Derek can’t make it work with him he can’t make it work with anyone, as though that will somehow cushion the blow. It won’t though. Stiles knows it won’t.

Stiles closes his email, and tries to ignore his rising anxiety.

He loves Derek. He doesn’t want to force Derek to change, but he does want him to be happy. Does that count as trying to change him?

Erica tugs Stiles’s earbuds out of her ears, and leans over and rests her head on his shoulder. “You okay, Batman?”

“Mmm.” He’s not, and she knows it. “I’m just… I dunno. Hyped up or something.”

“There’s a bit of that going around,” Erica says, and Stiles snorts in agreement as he looks across the aisle.

Steiner’s knee is jiggling as though he’s got ants in his pants.

“Hey, thanks for offering to drive me home,” he says.

“You practically live next door to me,” Erica says.

She actually lives an hour away from him in Blue Lake Valley, but what’s an hour between friends? Stiles hopes Boyd feels as generously about the extra distance, since Erica volunteered him as taxi driver, and he’s damn sure they’ve got better things to be doing than driving Stiles home. Actually, he’s heard in what can only be described as gynaecological detail exactly what Erica has planned for Boyd the second they’re alone.

“Thanks, though, Catwoman,” he says, and reaches down to squeeze her hand.

*****

Time slows to a crawl when the plane begins its descent, and the final minutes of their journey stretch out into impossible hours, into years, into millennia. Stiles squirms in his seat and then leans over Erica to see out the window, willing the patchwork brown landscape beneath them to resolve itself into roads, buildings, cars. It seems to take forever.

When the wheels of the plane hit the ground with a bump, everyone cheers.

Then there’s another interminable wait while they taxi in.

And another one until the doors are opened.

What do they look like, Stiles wonders as he slings his backpack over his shoulder and crams into the aisle, making space for Erica to slide in front of him. He can see sunlight at the front of the plane now, where the door is open, and a stream of uniforms shuffling down the aisle. What do they look like when they climb down the stairs though? Can the people waiting for them even tell them apart as they make their way onto the tarmac? Lotta guys with the same build here, the same uniform, the same caps and sunglasses. He wonders if their families have to wait for them to resolve into familiar features the way the patchwork landscape did when the plane was making its descent. A wall of uniforms slowly dissolving into the familiar curve of a jaw, crooked shape of a nose, eye colour, and at last a familiar smile.

Stiles’s boots hit the stairs and he squints in the sunlight.

He wishes Dad was here.

There’s a group of people waiting over behind an orange line painted on the tarmac, but if they’re supposed to stay there, they don’t. As soon as boots start hitting the tarmac, people rush forward.

Stiles thinks he spots Boyd before Boyd spots Erica, which is fair, because photos did not do him justice. The guy is huge. He’s tall and broad, with the sort of width across his shoulders that could be measured in axe handles. Jesus, Erica wasn’t exaggerating when she said she was going to climb him like a tree. She might even need abseiling gear.

“Boyd!” Erica screams when she reaches the tarmac, and then she’s off running.

Boyd catches her as she leaps into his arms, and swings her around.

Stiles can’t stop the grin spreading over his face, even when his chest aches jealously.

He begins to walk over to where they are, dodging dozens of other reunions—wow, someone’s even brought the family dog, which is _awesome_ —dragging his feet a little so he doesn’t intrude on their moment.

And that’s when he catches sight of a familiar khaki uniform.

At first glance he registers it as Dad, but it’s not, it’s—

Stiles’s breath catches in his throat.

It’s _Derek_.

It’s Derek, standing on the orange line still, with an anxious, pinched look on his gorgeous face, and a chalkboard sign.

Stiles freezes when he reads the words:

IT’S BEEN 172 DAYS.

THIS SHIT IS FINALLY OVER.

CPL STILINSKI

REPORT FOR BOYFRIEND DUTY.

Someone sobs like a baby—oh shit, it’s him, it’s definitely him—and then Stiles is rushing forward and sandwiching the chalkboard between him and Derek as they kiss.

It’s been 172 days since their last kiss, and this one is terrible. It’s not a kiss so much as it’s Stiles smearing their mouths together messily, and he knows he stinks, and he tastes like plane food—and plane food on a military plane is even worse than regular plane food—and his brain and his face can’t figure out if they’re supposed to be crying or laughing, but it’s _Derek_. It’s been 172 days, and a whole lot of them were beyond shitty—a lot of them will come back to Stiles in nightmares and flashbacks, he knows—but it’s over now. It’s over, and he’s home, and Derek’s here.

“Oh my god,” he says, leaning back just far enough to look into Derek’s eyes. He holds Derek’s face between his calloused palms. “Do you have a brain tumor? Cancer? Are you dying? Did the ghost of Christmas Past visit you? Christmas _Future_?”

Derek’s smile is as rueful as the morning after the first night they hooked up, like he knows Stiles is nothing but trouble, but here he is anyway. “That’s a lot of words for ‘Why the sign?’”

Stiles nods frantically. “Why the sign, Der?”

“Because I love you, Stiles,” Derek says. “I love you, and I missed you, and I want everyone to know.”

Stiles blinks and hot tears slide down his cheeks. “Derek…”

Derek leans in and kisses him again, a featherlight brush of his lips against Stiles’s. “I’m sorry.”

“What are you sorry for?”

“I’m sorry I took so long to realise exactly what you mean to me,” Derek says. “I’m sorry for letting my past get in the way of what we have.”

The world has shrunk to just the two of them. They’re surrounded by laughing, crying people, and that one excited dog, but Stiles is deaf and blind to anything that isn’t Derek. Then again, hasn’t he always been since the moment he first met the new deputy three years ago? It was lust at first sight, not love, but it’s love now, and it has been for a long time. And he’s so proud of Derek for finding the courage to admit it aloud.

He laughs, and releases Derek’s face at last. He gestures to his uniform. “Does my dad know you’re skipping work for this?”

Derek’s eyes crinkle when he smiles. “Who do you think told me what time your flight got in?”

“Oh, man, that’s a talk I’m gonna have to have with him, I guess.” Stiles rests his hands on Derek’s shoulders. He digs his fingers in a little, just to make sure this is all real. “You made sure he ate healthy while I was away?”

“Yeah.” Derek’s smile widens. “I think that’s when he first figured it out.”

Yeah, no. Stiles is pretty sure his Dad knew the morning after they hooked up that first time, going on the raised-eyebrow look he gave Stiles as he drifted happily through the door that morning. Stiles wasn’t exactly subtle about his crush on Derek. Stiles isn’t exactly subtle about anything, actually. But Dad didn’t comment. Consenting adults and all. Though maybe he was more worried Stiles would overshare all the details, and there are probably a lot of things Dad doesn’t need to know, either about his son or his deputy. His blood pressure is already too high.

Stiles can’t wipe the smile off his face. “You made me a sign, Der.”

Derek’s cheeks pink up.

“And… and you mean it?” Stiles asks. “Boyfriend duty? Like, you’ll be out for me?”

“With you,” Derek corrects. He reaches up and curls his fingers through Stiles, where his hand is still resting on his shoulder. “ _With_ you.”

“Derek Hale,” Stiles says, his eyes wide with wonder, “I’m going to date you _so hard_.”

Derek shows his perfect teeth in a smile.

“I mean it! There will be movies,” Stiles says. “And cosy tables at restaurants. And, fuck it, _flowers_. I’m gonna blow my entire combat pay on flowers!”

“Please don’t,” Derek says, but he’s still smiling.

“Stiles!” Erica bounces over to him, pulling Boyd by the hand. “Stiles, this is Boyd.”

“Hey, man.” Stiles shakes his hand. “I’ve heard a lot about you.”

“You too,” Boyd says, and it can’t all be bad because he’s smiling.

“This is Derek,” Stiles says, grinning like a loon. “My boyfriend.”

Erica’s eyes are bright with delight. “I guess you don’t need that lift back to Beacon Hills after all?”

“I got it covered, I think,” Stiles says, holding Derek’s hand tightly.

“Nice sign,” Erica says, and roars with laughter when Derek blushes again.

*****

There’s some bullshit to go through. It’s the army; there’s always bullshit. They all have to line up and listen to the brass talk at them before dismissing them, and then there’s a wait while they track down their packs. Then they have to get signed out. It’s a whole goddamn process, and takes the better part of forty minutes. Forty minutes is nothing compared to five and a half months, but it’s torture when their families and friends are waiting for them.

“Miguel came through huh?” Erica asks, hoisting her pack onto her back.

“Yeah.” Stiles still can’t stop grinning.

“Good for him,” Erica says, and slaps him on the back. “And good for you too.”

Stiles draws in a shuddering breath.

“Don’t get cold feet now, Batman,” Erica says, and elbows him. “You gotta lock that down!”

Stiles laughs. “Right? It’s just… I dunno. I kept playing worst case scenarios in my head the entire time I’ve been deployed, and I was so ready to get my heart broken that I don’t really know what just happened.”

Erica raises her eyebrows. “How about you turn that brain of yours off for a minute, and just try to enjoy it?” She thumps him again, on the chest this time. “And we’re catching up on Saturday, right? We’re gonna drink some beers, debrief, and fight over whose boyfriend is hottest? It’s mine, by the way.”

“I will drag you down the gutter by your hair,” Stiles threatens.

“I could snap you like a twig,” Erica replies airily. “And not even break a fucking nail.”

They first bump, and then hug.

“See you Saturday, Batman,” Erica says as she squeezes him tightly.

“See you then, Catwoman.”

******

Stiles’s hands are shaking when he gets into the front seat of Derek’s cruiser, and he’s not even sure why. An adrenaline dump, maybe. He’s been forcing himself not to stress about his homecoming for weeks now—for months, probably—and what’s that emotional suppression except a whole new way to stress? A part of him can’t believe he’s here, let alone here with Derek. He saw too many coffins in Afghanistan to pretend it couldn’t happen to him.

“Oh, man.” He jiggles his leg. “I would kill for In-N-Out right now.”

“That’s our first stop, then,” Derek says.

In-N-Out is their first stop, and a gas station on the highway is the next, because Stiles eats too quickly and comes dangerously close to throwing it all back up again. Derek buys him a bottle of Canada Dry, and it’s such a mom thing to do—treating his nausea with ginger ale—that Stiles wants to laugh. He settles for sipping his ginger ale instead, and walking around the gas station forecourt until his stomach settles.

Then Derek joins him, and they wander onto the grassy verge beside the gas station, and they sit. Stiles thinks that this is more of a homecoming than any cheering people at the base. This right here: a gas station, a passing stream of traffic, a stretch of stringy grass littered with trash, and a woman yelling at her small dog to hurry up and piss. Stiles doesn’t think he’s ever stopped at this gas station before, but it feels just like home should. It feels like road trips with his friends when they were back in school. It feels like long summers of having some place to go, but being in no real hurry to get there. And it feels like leaning into the guy sitting next to him, while ginger ale bubbles tickle his nose.

The sign…

The sign was great, but this right here? This might be even better.

He knocks his shoulder against Derek’s. “Well, now that I’ve brought shame on my ancestors by getting sick trying to inhale an entire strawberry shake in five seconds, I guess we can get back on the road.”

“I guess so,” Derek says, but makes no move to stand up yet.

Neither does Stiles.

“I missed you,” he says at last, keeping his eyes fixed on the road, unsure if he can bare his soul and bear the weight of Derek’s gaze at the same time. “I had some bad days over there.” He snorts. “Some really god-fucking-awful nights as well. There were a couple of times I thought that I might not get to see you again, and Jesus, Der, I was just trying to hold onto you in my head, and…” He clamps his mouth shut and shakes his head. “Sorry. Fuck. Sorry.”

“Hey.” Derek reaches out and cups his cheeks. Turns his head toward him. His gaze isn’t heavy at all. It’s warm and gentle. “Don’t apologise for whatever’s going through your head. I missed you too, Stiles. I missed you more than I could say.” He grimaces, and wrinkles his nose. “Well, obviously, right? You know I’m terrible with words.”

“You really are.” The words hitch on something caught between a laugh and a sob. “God. You really are.”

Derek’s smile is beautiful.

“The sign was nice though,” Stiles says, clearing his throat. “I’ve mentioned that, right? I mean, you did good with the words today. You did real good.”

Derek leans in and kisses him softly, and Stiles closes his eyes and just tries to let go. To be here, now, with Derek. To let the past five and a half months turn to dust and float away on the dry California wind. He knows it won’t be that easy, but that’s okay. Just for now, he can feel the weight of it lifting from his shoulders, and he’ll take it. He knows there’s shit he’ll have to deal with later, when it all regroups, but he’ll take the respite for now.

Derek leans back first, and Stiles lets out a small, disappointed sound, like a kid suddenly deprived of a treat.

“Go buy some snacks for the road,” Derek says. He tugs his wallet out of his pocket and tosses it to Stiles. Then he climbs to his feet and holds his hands down to haul him up. “I need the bathroom.”

And he smacks Stiles on the ass to get him moving.

Stiles laughs.

Derek might actually be getting the hang of this boyfriend duty stuff himself.

*****

Stiles comes out of the gas station store with enough junk food that he and Derek could probably drive to Canada without stopping to resupply. He walks over to the cruiser, the handles of the plastic bag digging into his palm.

Derek’s leaning on the trunk, his arms folded over his chest in the way that really makes his biceps bulge. Jesus. Stiles is going to do so many filthy things to him tonight. He’s so fucking tired of his own hand. He’s even more tired of trying to jerk off on a squeaky bunk before anyone else can figure out where the noise is coming from, and throws shit at him to make him stop. It’s… boundaries are pretty much non-existent after living in each other’s pockets for so long. The point is, Stiles is going to blow Derek’s mind tonight. His mind, and his dick.

“I got a bunch of stuff,” he says, holding the bulging bag up. “It’s your own fault for having a hundred dollar bill in your wallet.”

Derek’s eyebrows tug together. “I had a hundred dollar bill in my wallet?”

“You did have,” Stiles says. “Now you’ve got like two twenties and some change.”

Derek’s eyebrows make a break for his hairline.

God, Stiles has missed the way he can have whole conversations with Derek’s eyebrows.

“I may have gone a little bit overboard,” he admits. “But also, we’ve got so much here that once we hit Beacon Hills, we won’t need to get out of bed for at least twenty-four hours.”

“I’m not living on Twizzlers.”

“Twizzlers and dick,” Stiles corrects. He swaggers up to Derek, trying to look seductive. Derek’s eyebrows judge him. Stiles winks, and repeats, “Twizzlers and _dick_.”

Derek’s smile destroys the intimidating thing his eyebrows were going for. “You’re an idiot.”

But he says it as though he likes it.

“I’m your idiot,” Stiles reminds him.

“Yeah, you are.” Derek shifts from foot to foot, his expression going a little weird and pinched.

“Der?”

“Okay, um.” Derek flushes.

“Loquacious as always,” Stiles says, and then his smile falters. “Are you okay, Der?”

Derek straightens up, squaring his shoulders. “Yes. Just…” He gestures at Stiles. “Just stand there for a second, okay?”

“Okay,” Stiles agrees warily.

Derek opens the back door of the cruiser and leans inside. Stiles stays where he’s told, but he might lean to the side to get a decent look at the way Derek’s uniform pants pull tightly across his ass as he bends over. What? He’s only human.

Stiles’s brow crinkles as Derek tugs the chalkboard sign out of the back of the cruiser.

“So,” Derek says, and clears his throat. He props the sign against his legs. “So, Laura and Cora helped me make this.”

Stiles smiles at the thought of that. He loves Laura and Cora, but mostly he loves that for them to have helped, Derek would have had to tell them that he and Stiles were together. That Derek wanted more. That he wanted it to be real. That Derek wrote those words with his sisters watching over him.

IT’S BEEN 172 DAYS.

THIS SHIT IS FINALLY OVER.

CPL STILINSKI

REPORT FOR BOYFRIEND DUTY.

Although, knowing Laura and Cora, they probably weren’t watching over him so much as they were drinking wine and loudly judging Derek’s artistic skills and font choices.

Derek bits his lower lip. “But, um, but they didn’t see the back.”

Stiles’s heart skips a beat as Derek slowly spins the sign around.

MARRY ME, STILES?

The rush of blood in his skull is as loud as a freight train, as loud as a hurricane. He has to blink back tears to bring the words back into focus.

MARRY ME, STILES?

They’re still there.

“I…” He chokes up as Derek goes down onto one knee, and fights back the crazy urge to laugh, or scream, or something. What is even _happening_ right now? “Holy fuck, Der! I’ve been in fire fights that were less scary than this!”

Derek holds his gaze, his face pale and anxious.

“Yes!” Stiles exclaims. “I should have led with that. Yes! Yes, I’m going to marry the _shit_ out of you, Derek Hale! Now get the fuck up here so I can kiss you!”

Derek rises to his feet, his eyes shining with tears and a stupid handsome grin on his stupid handsome face.

When he tells Dad the story of the proposal, Stiles decides as they crush their mouths together in a kiss, he’s not going to tell him how many times he said fuck.

Dad will probably guess anyway.

He laughs as Derek lifts him and spins him. Okay, as Derek _tries_ to lift him, and his boots scrape on the asphalt of the forecourt, and they both end up stumbling hard against the trunk of the cruiser, and Stiles knocks his hip so hard that he's pretty sure he'll bruise. 

Still, when Stiles tells the story of the proposal, it will be a romantic flawless lift and spin.

Also, that lady won’t still be in the background yelling at her dog to hurry up and piss so they can keep driving.

But it doesn’t matter, because it’s perfect anyway.

Boyfriend duty? Screw that. Stiles just got promoted to _husband_ duty.

Stiles is home, right here in Derek’s arms, and everything is going to be perfect.


End file.
